Singing Flower, Dancing Water
by Taliax
Summary: Flynn wasn't the first boy to break into Rapunzel's Tower.


**A/N: Starting the New Year off with something that's actually half old. This story's been languishing unfinished in one of my binders for somewhere around a year now, and it's actually one of the better things I've written in my opinion, so I decided it deserved to be finished. Enjoy~ :D**

**Oh yeah, and this was vaguely inspired by Raberba girl's "Shadowless Princesses" stories, which got me thinking about crack/semi-crack pairings that would be fun to write and might actually work. DemZel was the first thing I thought of.**

**EDIT: One of my wonderful friends drew an amazing fanart based on this story! :D She gave me permission to use her drawing as the cover for this. The full-size version can be found here - maltytoast. webs. apps/photos/photo?photoid=189005380 (minus the spaces).**

Demyx stepped out of a dark corridor into a flowery field and grinned. So this was the world he was supposed to recon, huh? Pretty field, bubbling creek, no sign of Heartless… That was enough recon, right? Oh, and there was a giant tower right in the middle of the clearing. That was probably important too, considering the world was called "Rapunzel's Tower."

"Looks like a good place for a vacation," he said to himself. Not the tower, but the land around it was really pretty and peaceful-looking. He could probably play his sitar as loud as he wanted and nobody would hear to yell at him.

Unless there were people in that tower… Well, he had to check it out for the mission, anyway.

Demyx waded across the creek, using his powers to dry himself when he got to the other side, and circled the tower. No doors? Weird. Well, there was one spot that might've once been a door, but it was packed tight with rocks.

He looked to the top of the tower, where there were a few windows and a balcony. Above one window was… a hook? Huh, maybe someone threw a rope over it and climbed up? Sounded like way too much work. Sheesh, just walking up stairs to the top would be a pain, if there even were stairs. Or maybe the people here used corridors? Or could fly?

He shook his head. Saïx would never accept a mission report with those kinds of conspiracy theories and no evidence. His reports were barely passable as it was, for reasons including "chickenscratch, informality, and lack of effort" in Saïx's words. But hey, the lousy mission rewards the Organization gave out were hardly worth the effort he _did _put in. Maybe he'd work harder if he got paid in munny. Or junk food. Or music CDs.

Sighing, Demyx wondered if he could get away with ignoring the tower because there wasn't a way in (barring dark corridors…) when a beautiful voice reached his ears.

"_Seven A.M., the usual morning line up…" _the voice sang.

_Man, it's only seven? X-Face got me up early!_ He didn't dwell on the thought too long, though. He wanted to know what girl – the voice was obviously female – could sing that well, so he put his laziness aside and corridored onto the tower balcony.

The first thing he saw was a long, flowing river of… _hair? _He rubbed his eyes and blinked a few times, but it was still there, draped across furniture and snaking over the floor. It took him a full minute to follow the trail of hair with his eyes to the back of a girl's head. She was currently singing while she swept under her massive amounts of hair.

_Wow, _Demyx thought, _A girl who's pretty, sings like an angel, and knows how to clean? Wish we had someone like her in the Org… So I guess she's Rapunzel, if this is her tower._

She hadn't noticed him yet, too caught up with sweeping and her song. Demyx could use her as an excuse to be done with the mission – the Organization was supposed to stay secret, so he couldn't go in there and get caught. But surprisingly, he didn't want to leave yet. He _wanted _to do recon, so he could figure out more about the weird girl with yards of hair. Besides, what would he do back at the castle? It was so boring there, and Saïx would just get on his case about his lousy mission reports.

Rapunzel finished sweeping and sang her way out of the room. Without thinking that he might get caught, Demyx followed her.

Nobody – with a lowercase N – would've expected it from looking at him, but Demyx could be pretty stealthy when he wanted to, a skill honed from years of recon missions, avoiding other missions, and sneaking extra dessert from the Kitchen of Brewing Darkness. Rapunzel wasn't exactly paying attention to anything besides her chores, anyway. Demyx found himself humming along to her song as she polished and waxed, did laundry, mopped, and shined up. By the time she swept again, he was so relaxed about following her around that he clapped for her when her song was over.

"Hey, that was great! Can I get an encore?"

Demyx's grin dropped when she spun around and faced him with a look of horror.

"Hi." He forced a grin back onto his face, hoping she might not mind him breaking into her house if he explained himself. She looked nice enough; maybe she'd understand that he was just a poor, overworked member of a secret Organization who was only here because his boss made him. "Nice to meet you, my name's Dem—hey, what are you-?"

Rapunzel pulled a frying pan out of one of the cabinets and conked him over the head.

XXX

Rapunzel, frankly, was terrified. There was a _boy _in her tower! How did he even get up here? He looked a bit scrawny to climb up by himself. What if there were others?

"Pascal!" She called for her friend. The chameleon hopped down from the kitchen counter and onto her palm. "Keep guard at the window, alright?"

Pascal saluted with his tail and scampered off, leaving Rapunzel to figure out what to do with the boy. He didn't look so scary when he was unconscious… She prodded his lip with her frying pan, revealing even white teeth. Her eyebrows quirked. No fangs? Was this really a boy? Mother said men had fangs… maybe they didn't grow in until they were older, then. This boy looked only a little older than her.

She still didn't know what to do with him, though. Mother wouldn't be home for hours; she was out tending her gardens. Well… the best thing to do would probably be to tie him up so he couldn't hurt her when he regained consciousness.

He wasn't very heavy, as she noticed when she set him upright in a chair. With her hair she bound his arms, legs, and torso, wondering why he was wearing such a thick black coat. The coat sure looked like something a bad guy would wear, but his face… she almost giggled at his peaceful sleeping expression and how his hair stuck up so strangely, right on top of his head.

Pascal came back when she was finished tying him up.

"Notice anything weird?"

The chameleon shook his head.

"Good. Let's wake this boy up and see if we can get some answers out of him."

They didn't expect him to be such a heavy sleeper – they tried slapping him, yelling, even getting Pascal to give him a wet-willy. Rapunzel was glad he was still breathing, otherwise she would've thought she killed him. She didn't want that on her conscience, no matter who he was.

Eventually Rapunzel got a bowl of water and dumped it over his head, plastering his hair to his face.

XXX

"Ack! No, Saïx, please! Anything but _homework!" _Demyx cried, still half stuck in his dream. "Wait, why can't I see?" His hair was wet, so he dried it magically and blew it out of his face. Man, it had taken him hours to style it this morning! That probably wasn't as important as the fact that he was tied to a chair and had a throbbing pain in the back of his skull, but he was more upset about it anyway. Wait, he was tied to a chair?

"How did you do that?" Rapunzel asked in an accusing voice.

"Huh?" Demyx looked up to face her. "Why did you tie me up with your hair? Hey, and you knocked me out with a frying pan, too! That wasn't very nice!"

Rapunzel blinked in surprise, setting an empty bowl on the ground, but then she picked up her frying pan and pointed it at him. Demyx flinched.

"Answer my question first," she demanded.

He wondered how much damage she could do with that frying pan. Well, she'd knocked him out before, and he didn't doubt she could do it again. And she'd looked so nice earlier…

"Water magic," he decided to answer. It came out as an embarrassing squeak. Good thing Xigbar and Axel weren't here to see him like this.

"Magic? You have magic hair too?" She asked eagerly, relaxing and letting her frying pan drop a little. Demyx suddenly noticed the lizard glaring at him from her shoulder. Rapunzel just kept getting weirder and weirder.

"Er, the water magic's not in my hair, it's in… well, all of me." He shrugged, which was difficult in the tight ropes of hair. "I don't have magic hair, unless you count its anti-gravity-ness. But you have magic hair?" He grinned. "That's awesome! What does it do, change color? Dance?"

Rapunzel stared at him. "Wait, you _don't _know what my hair does?"

Demyx tilted his head. "Why? Did you tell me earlier? I was unconscious, so I couldn't hear you. Why'd you do that, anyway?"

She looked even more confused than he was as she turned aside to mutter with her lizard. What was going on?

"Show me your 'water magic,'" she said after a few moments.

"Sure." He smiled at her. "Dance, water, dance!"

Three of his water clones appeared, making Rapunzel's jaw drop. They danced around, and one took her hands and spun her around in circles. The lizard flew off of her shoulder and hit Demyx's chest, gesturing at him in aggravation afterwards.

"Sorry, little guy."

The lizard snorted and stuck its nose up at him. The water clones spun Rapunzel to and from each other until they eventually came to a stop and disappeared in poofs of bubbles, leaving her stumbling dizzily and giggling a little.

"You really are magic," she said with a smile, holding her arm out for her lizard to climb back on. It glared while walking backwards up her arm, but somehow it didn't fall off.

"Told you so. What magic do you have? Are you a Nobody?"

"Nobody?" She asked in confusion.

"You know, a person without a heart?" Another blank stare. "Uh, nevermind. Can I see your magic?"

"Um…" She chewed her lip nervously. "Well, I guess that's fair. But you can't tell anyone."

He would've mimed zipping his lips, but his arms – as well at the rest of him – were still tied up, so he just nodded.

A look of concentration settled on her face, and she began to sing.

"_Flower, gleam and glow. Let your power shine. Make the clock reverse, bring back what once was mine." _Demyx gasped as a golden glow spread through her hair from roots to ends. _"Heal what has been hurt. Change the fate's design. Save what has been lost, bring back what once was mine… what once was mine."_

Demyx's eyes were too wide for his face by the time she finished. "Hey, my head doesn't hurt anymore."

She winced. "Sorry about that… You scared me," she said softly.

Demyx burst out laughing, making her jump in surprise. "You were scared? Of _me?"_

"I've never seen a boy before!" She defended. "And your head doesn't hurt because my hair healed it."

"You can cast Curaga with your _hair?" _He beamed. _That's even cooler than it defying gravity! If I could do that, I'd never have to buy potion panels from Gloomex again! _"Awesome! Hey, what do you mean about me being the first boy you've ever seen? I'm not the first _ever, _am I?"

She looked away. "You are. I've never left this tower." He was about to ask another question, but she cut him off. "I don't want to talk about it."

"Okay." He was curious, but he shrugged. He'd already bothered her enough by sneaking into her house. Speaking of which… "Sorry for scaring you. I'm here looking for Heartless." It was almost true. He decided his earlier plan of telling her everything about the Organization and his recon mission might be a bad idea; he didn't want to scare her or make it sound like he was stalking her.

"Heartless?" She asked.

"Yeah. They're scary black things with glowy eyes and antennae." He would've mimed the antennae with his fingers, but again, he was still stuck.

"I've seen some weird black things out the windows lately. They haven't gotten in here yet…" Worry crossed her face. "Why do you want to find them?"

"I beat 'em up. Like a superhero or something." He grinned. It was a great cover, and it made him look cool, too, even if he technically couldn't collect hearts.

"Really?" She smiled at him. "Wow, I'm glad you're the first boy I've met. Are other boys as nice as you?"

Demyx blushed a little from the compliment. "Well… most of the other boys I know aren't very nice. Xigbar and Axel can be when they want to, and Zexion isn't really mean…" The Organization wasn't exactly the best place for nice people. In fact, if you were nice, the other members would just take advantage of you. Demyx had learned this the hard way.

"Oh." Rapunzel frowned.

"Uh… can you untie me now?" Her hair was really soft, but Demyx had been tangled in it through their entire conversation, and it was starting to chafe his neck (the only place not covered by his coat or pants).

"Oh! Pascal, what do you think?" She whispered to her lizard, who shook its head. "Come on, he's magical too, and he sounds so nice…" More head-shaking from the lizard. Why was she so concerned with its opinion, anyway? "He could've hurt us already if he wanted to. Remember his water people?"

It took a lot of persuading from Rapunzel and the most innocent expression Demyx could make, but eventually Pascal deemed him unthreatening enough.

"He was suspicious of me when I first met him, too," Rapunzel said, carefully unwrapping her hair from around him and the chair. He took a deep breath, glad to completely fill his lungs again.

"Thanks." He grinned, rubbing his neck. "So… how did you get magic hair?"

She shifted uncomfortably. "How did you get water magic?"

He frowned and tapped his chest. "I lost my heart."

"You… what?" Her eyes widened.

Demyx shrugged. "The Heartless stole it."

"But you fight Heartless," she said.

"I fight them now, since I don't have much left to lose." He shrugged again. The poor girl looked terrified.

"Will you help me fight the Heartless? Please?" Rapunzel latched onto his arm, beaming fearful green Puppy Eyes at him.

"Er… um…" He was on recon; he didn't want to sign up for extra work. But how could he say no to those eyes? "I'll kill them for you if they get in here, but I won't go out and leave you in here all alone." Judging by her skills with that frying pan, she could take care of herself, but it was an excuse to make her feel better and to get out of fighting.

She hugged him tightly and very unexpectedly. "Thank you so much, uh… what's your name?"

"Demyx." He smiled. "And you're-" Wait, it might freak her out if she knew he knew her name. "Who are you?"

"I'm Rapunzel." She smiled back. It was a mouthful, almost as much as "Lexaeus" or "Zexion."

"That's long. How about I call you Zel?"

"Well… okay, I guess."

Demyx grinned. "Hi, Zel."

For a moment there was a semi-awkward silence, during which Pascal rolled his eyes and crawled down from Rapunzel to scamper off to who knew where. Then she got an idea, and her whole face lit up with it.

"Do you want to see my paintings?"

Demyx looked around at the walls, which were filled with painted designs. "You mean there are more than these?"

She nodded and practically dragged him up the stairs to her bedroom, her river of hair being pulled along behind her. Demyx gaped at the paintings covering the curved walls and ceiling. How did she even get _up _there? Come to think of it, how did she get up in this tower at all?

"Wow. That makes everything I've ever drawn look like blobs and scribbles." That was an understatement, since all of Demyx's drawings _were _blobs or scribbles. Rapunzel had painted beautiful flowers and suns and other bright, girly images everywhere – she must have a lot of a time on her hands. Without even thinking about it, he was gathering information for his mission report.

"You like them?" She beamed. "Mother and Pascal don't pay much attention to them anymore, and you're the only other person I've met in… well, forever."

"You must be lonely," Demyx said softly. Then something clicked. "Wait, you have a mom? Is she here?" His eyes darted around in panic. Rapunzel was one thing, but Saïx would chew him out if he let _everyone _see him.

She shook her head. "Mother won't be back until late."

He sighed in relief. "I can keep you company until she gets back."

"Really? You'll do that?" She looked like she'd just won a lifetime supply of sea-salt ice cream.

"Sure, I can't go home for a while anyway."

"Where to do you live?" Zel asked. Demyx leaned against the wall, trying to hide his nervousness by acting cool.

"Oh, just… somewhere. Far away." He waved an arm vaguely.

"Does everyone there where those silly coats?" Rapunzel laughed a little.

"My coat is _not _silly! It's awesome!" Demyx protested with a slight pout.

"Sorry, _awesome," _she corrected, smiling. So first she thought he was scary, and now she thought he was silly. She really hadn't had much human interaction. "Aren't you hot, though?"

"Nah, not really." He had been when he'd first joined the Organization, but he was used to it by now. "I'm not supposed to take it off, anyway."

"Why not?" She asked with honest curiosity. He was going to get himself in trouble if he kept blurting things out without thinking.

"Uh… I'll get sunburn. Yeah," he came up with off the top of his head, then quickly changed the subject. "Do you plan an instrument?"

"Guitar," she replied, eyes brightening. "Do you?"

Demyx nodded eagerly. "Sitar for the win~!"

"Sitar? Is that like a guitar?"

Grinning, he summoned Arpeggio to show her. "A little bit, but sitar's cooler."

"Oh… Well, would you want to play a song with me even though my instrument's not as cool as yours?" Rapunzel asked.

"That would be awesome!" Demyx replied. "No one back home appreciates music much."

She brushed his arm sympathetically. "Well I do. Come on, I have to find my guitar."

They settled on the floor of another brightly-painted room with their instruments.

"What songs do you know?" Rapunzel asked.

"Let's see; 'Laughter and Merriment,' 'Dearly Beloved,' a little bit of 'The Thirteenth Struggle,' 'The Sitar Song,' 'One Week'…" he trailed off, ticking off the songs on his fingers. "I can play lots of stuff."

"I don't know any of those. Would you play one for me? Please?" She added.

"Easy." He smiled, happy to have a friend – he considered her one already – who wanted to hear his music. "Which one do you want me to play?"

"Hmm… 'Dearly Beloved' sounds pretty."

It was the simplest song he knew, so he didn't get to show off as much as he would've liked, but he played it because that was what she wanted to hear. The room gave his melody an odd echo, but she seemed to enjoy it anyway, swaying in time and humming along. Her bright hair shined whenever she moved, and Demyx wondered if it was only her special song that made it glow. Maybe he was just imagining it now. It didn't matter; she was pretty even when her hair was a normal blonde and not gold. He repeated the song twice because he could play it without watching his fingers, so it gave him more time to look at her. She had a nice face and thin little eyebrows and bare feet. Of course, she wouldn't need shoes if she was stuck in this tower.

He eventually finished the song, letting his fingers fidget with one of his coat's drawstrings instead of his sitar strings. "So, did you like it?"

"That was beautiful," she said sincerely. "It was like… like… being hugged by music."

Demyx laughed at her simile. "Hugs are good."

"Yeah," she laughed along a little self-consciously.

He hugged her on impulse, and she froze.

"…Demyx…?"

"Hugs are good," he replied sheepishly, letting go. "I never get to hug anyone at the Caste 'cause Larxene shocks me and Xigbar warps me away and Zexion puts me in his book and Saïx is scary…" His face warmed as he rambled. Saïx would eat him alive when he RTC'd.

Rapunzel hugged him back. "It's okay. I'm not going to hurt you."

"…Thanks, Zel." His smile slowly returned. "Can I hear you play now?"

"Sure." She placed her guitar in her lap, brushing hair out of her face. "I probably don't know as many songs as you."

"That's okay. Just play something you do know."

"Well… okay."

Face scrunched in adorable concentration, she strummed a few soft chords, then began to pluck an upbeat melody that made Demyx want to clap or stomp in rhythm. He nearly did when her song began to crescendo, but he settled for drumming his fingers on his knee. She didn't play quite as well as he did, fingers occasionally slipping on too-quick notes, but he still enjoyed her performance and applauded when she struck the last chord. Rapunzel smiled, setting her guitar aside.

"That was great! What's it called?"

"I don't know, but I hear it on my birthday every year. I think it comes from the Kingdom, like the lights." She twirled a long lock of hair around her fingers.

"Lights? What lights?" That might be useful to know for his mission report.

"I don't know what they are." She sighed. "There's so much I wish I knew…"

"Because you're stuck in this tower?" He asked. She'd said that earlier, but if her mom could get in and out, surely she could too?

Rapunzel curled her legs against her chest, hiding herself in a blanket of hair. "…Kind of. Can we please not talk about it?"

"But I could help you," Demyx continued eagerly. "I could let you share my coat and take you through a portal and we'd be out. Easy as cake. Well, easier than cake since making cake's kind of hard, but eating cake's easy."

She shook her head violently. "I'm not leaving, okay? I'm just not." She was shutting down again, the bits of her expression that were visible becoming hardened and closed off.

"Hey, I'm sorry," Demyx apologized, pushing her hair out of her face. After being around emotionless Nobodies for so long, he wasn't used to navigating a normal girl's minefield-feelings. "Don't be mad."

Zel sniffed. "I'm not mad at you, Demyx. You're a good friend."

Demyx stretched out his legs, leaning back on his hands. The stone floor felt cold underneath them. "You're a good friend too." Sure, he'd only known her for less than a day, but she played an instrument and said nice things about his music. That was enough for her to become his insta-friend. "So if you don't want to leave, what do you want to do?"

"Um… I don't know," Rapunzel admitted. "I'm not used to having anyone to do things with. Except Pascal, of course."

"Me either," Demyx admitted, shifting to sit criss-cross-applesauce and vanishing his sitar. "But where I used to live, I had lots of friends."

"Really?"

He couldn't lie with her smiling so brightly. "Well, no. Not really. But I had some friends. We liked to get ice cream at McDuck's place every Thursday." He smiled nostalgically. He hadn't thought of any of his old Radiant Garden friends in a long time… because they didn't exist anymore.

"Ice cream?" Zel asked. "What's that?"

Demyx shook the old thoughts away. "Wait, you've never heard of ice cream?"

"No," she admitted. "What is it?"

"Only the best thing _ever," _Demyx said seriously. "Hold on, I'll be right back!"

In less than a minute, Demyx dashed through a dark corridor, dug two ice cream bars out of the kitchen freezer, and ran back through the same corridor. "Here!" He held a bar out.

Rapunzel was gaping. Oh yeah. Normal people didn't get around with scary swirly portals.

"You have a lot more magic than I do," she said in awe.

"Heh. Well you have a lot more feelings than I do, so it kinda evens out." Demyx shrugged. "You better eat that before it gets all melty and gross."

She took the paper-wrapped ice cream bar and stared at it, thin eyebrows scrunching in confusion. "I'm supposed to _eat _this?"

"Yeah!" Demyx ripped off the wrapper on his ice cream bar and took a bite. "See? It's good."

"Ohhh," Rapunzel carefully removed the wrapper from her own ice cream.

"Guess they don't wrap food here." Demyx grinned and took another bite. "Whoops, I didn't mean to get sea-salt, though. Axel's always mixing them up with my mango ones. Oh well, they're still pretty good." Hopefully Axel wouldn't start a Boss Battle when he found out…

Zel nibbled at her light-blue bar, smiling wide when she tasted the salty-sweet flavor. "Wow, this _is _good! It's like… It's like… I can't even describe it!"

"Like the ocean?" Demyx suggested.

"I wouldn't know. I've never been to the ocean."

That hit him right in the heart he didn't have. The beach was only the best place in all the worlds, even better than the Gardens. Before becoming a Nobody, he had only been to the beach once. It had been the best day of his life.

"I can take you there!" Demyx said earnestly, even though he knew she didn't want to leave. "Please, pleeeeease let me take you! It'll be the best thing ever, I promise! Even better than ice cream!"

"I can't," Rapunzel said, though she sounded more regretful than before.

"But you could! It would be easy, just step through a portal and _poof, _we'll be there!" Demyx took her hands. "Don't you want to know what it's like out there?"

She slid her hands out of his. "Yes, but…"

"But what?"

"…I'm scared." Her head hung limply. "This is the only place I've ever known, and you and Mother and Pascal are the only people I've ever known."

"We'll be the only ones there – me and you, I mean, not your mom."

Rapunzel glanced back and forth. "She might be home soon…"

"It's, like, noon. Probably earlier. When's your mom get home?"

"Around sunset…"

"That's plenty of time!" Demyx grinned, tossing aside his ice cream stick. Zel's unfinished bar was dripping on her dress, so she ate the rest quickly.

"…How do I know it's not a trap?" She whispered thoughtfully.

"Huh?"

"You could have lied to me, and you want to take me away to steal my hair for yourself. How do I know you won't do that?"

"Because you're my friend. And I promise," Demyx replied simply.

Zel looked surprised at first, but a smile soon spread across her face. "Okay," she said, "I trust you."

"Really?" Demyx beamed.

"Yes. You promised."

"Then what are we waiting for?" He jumped up, flicking his wrist to form a dark corridor.

Rapunzel's confidence waned again. "We're going through _there?"_

"How else would we get there?" Demyx unzipped and shrugged off his coat. "It's safe as long as you're wearing this."

"I thought you said you'd get sunburn," Zel said dubiously, looking at his pasty arms. Good thing he'd never been very self-conscious.

"I might get sunburn when we get there-" he poked his small, pale bicep, "-but there's no sun in the corridors."

Demyx draped the coat over the two of them and led her through the corridor. Normally he ran once he was inside – not because he liked running, but because it was scary and he might get lost and end up in Agrabah or some other horribly dry place. He couldn't run with Zel, though, or they might trip and fall off the semi-solid path and end up some place even worse than Agrabah. Corridors were tricky like that.

"It _is _dark in here." Rapunzel shivered.

"Keep looking over there," Demyx said, pointing to the bright portal at the other end of the corridor. "We'll be out soon."

She was shaking, her long, blonde hair trailing back so far it wasn't in the corridor yet. Hopefully it wouldn't be damaged by the darkness.

They stumbled out of the dark corridor and onto a broad swath of sand. Demyx's coat had protected Zel from the darkness, but she was still dizzy, and the bright sunlight wasn't helping.

"Whoa…" she swayed, bare feet tripping in the sand. Demyx squeaked and tried to catch her, but they were tangled together in his coat and her hair, and they both toppled over.

"Well, we're here," Demyx said cheerfully.

"I don't feel so good…" Zel moaned, eyes closed.

He used a potion panel, handing her the green bottle that appeared. "This'll make it better."

Apparently she felt bad enough not to be suspicious. She drank it in a few short gulps.

"Better?" Demyx asked.

Obviously she was, because she was already on her feet, running and kicking up sand and giggling with glee. That was fine with Demyx, who detangled himself from his coat and her hair and pranced around with her.

"This is amazing!" Rapunzel beamed, swinging him around in circles for a moment before suddenly dropping his hands. "Oh no. I shouldn't be here, I should _not _be here."

"…What?" Demyx asked, but she ignored him and ran off. "Wait! Where are you going?"

Even with his great recon skills, it took at least ten minutes before he finally found her in a cave behind a waterfall not far from the shore. By then she had already gone through several mood swings, finally ending in her sniffling in the very back of the cave, huddled in a blanket of her hair.

"Hey," Demyx said quietly so he wouldn't scare her away. "The beach isn't in here."

She laughed sadly, painfully. "Demyx, I shouldn't be here. I – I'm not ready."

He sat down beside her, heart falling. If he had one, that was. Maybe he did; how else could he feel so disappointed, so sad for her? Finally getting out of her tower, getting to see one of the most beautiful places in the worlds, and then backing down before she got to enjoy it.

"Zel," Demyx asked, "what are you waiting for?"

She wiped her eyes. "…What?"

"When are you going to be ready?" Demyx looked her in the eyes. "How long are you gonna wait?"

"I… I don't know." She traced the carvings in a rock with her finger.

"Please, _please _just stay a little while. Give yourself a chance," he begged. "If you don't wanna do it for yourself, at least do it for me."

Rapunzel looked up at him and pushed some of her hair away from her face. "Okay," she consented. "You're right, if I don't do this now, I might never be ready. I don't want to be scared forever."

"There's nothing to be scared of, anyway," Demyx assured her. "There's nobody here. Except me, but I'm a Nobody." He laughed at his own joke.

"Someone was." She pointed to the childish drawings scratched into the walls.

Demyx shrugged. "No one's here whenever I come, 'cept some birds and fish and stuff." He stood and held out a hand. "You ready now?"

"No…" She took his hand and smiled, "but I will be."

The beach was always awesome, but Demyx found that it was even more awesome with somebody to share it with. Zel chased crabs around the sand until their pinchers snapped dangerously close to her hair; she and Demyx built sandcastles and sandtowers fit for royalty; and they splashed through the shallow waves, Demyx leaving his boots and gloves and coat off even at the threat of sunburn.

"Best. Day. Ever!" Zel shoved a wall of saltwater at Demyx's face. He could've stopped it, but he was too busy laughing and ended up choking some of the foul-tasting stuff down.

"Bleck!" He coughed part of it back up. "Ice cream tastes way better…"

After finishing their water-fight, they flopped back on shore and Demyx magically dried them off. Dragging all of the water out of Rapunzel's massive amount of hair drained his magic even with three whole ethers, but for once he thought the effort was worth it.

"This _is_ the best day ever," Demyx contentedly agreed with her earlier statement.

"There's so much water, and so much sky." Rapunzel made slow sand-angels as she stared up at the blue expanse. "The world is really big."

"Yeah," he mumbled lazily, running his fingers through a long blonde lock that had escaped from the rest of her hair.

"It's so big, and somehow you found me." She rolled onto her side, facing him. He couldn't puzzle out the expression on her face. "I'm happy, but… why did you do it? Why did you care if I ever got to see the beach?"

"Huh." Demyx thought about it. According to everyone in the Organization, he shouldn't care. He shouldn't be able to. But… he did, didn't he? He couldn't look at her soft face and say he didn't. "I guess… I just felt like it." He smiled.

She smiled back, and he felt something soft brush his palm. At first he thought it was just her hair shifting, but when he looked he saw her hand resting in his. It felt nicer than he expected.

They lay on the sand, hand in hand, silently staring up at the blue sky slowly fading to orange and pink and red. Demyx couldn't think of any place he would rather be.

Rapunzel sighed slowly, sadly. "I wish this could last forever."

"It could," Demyx said, facing her. "Why go back?"

"I can't just leave my mother," she replied like it was the most obvious thing in the world.

"Why not?"

She shook her head. "She's the only family I have. And I'm all she has."

Demyx remembered his mom. Not that well, and not very often, but he remembered. She had bought him his first guitar, way back when he was a little kid. She had encouraged him when his sisters made fun of and complained about his playing. And most of all, she had loved him.

"Well… I can always come back," Demyx remembered. "I'll have to do more recon and fight Heartless and stuff. We can do this again."

Zel grinned. "Really?"

"Of course!" Demyx beamed back, letting go of her hand. "We'll go somewhere else next time. Ooh, I could take you to Atlantica!"

"Atlantica?"

"Yeah, it's great! You get to breathe underwater and sing with all the fish and – well, I'll show you next time I get a mission here. Maybe tomorrow."

"Tomorrow?"

"Yeah, if you want." He grinned. "Do you want to?"

"If Mother isn't home…" She sat up suddenly. "It's sunset. Oh no, it's sunset already! I need to get home, she could be home any minute…!"

Easy enough. He put his gloves and boots back on, cloaked himself and Zel in his coat, and led her out of their paradise and into a dark corridor.

"What if we're too late…?"

She hastily threw off his coat on the other side.

"Zel, it's okay!" Demyx called to her. "What's your mom gonna do, anyway?"

She was about to say something, but a voice from outside the tower cut her off.

"_Rapunzel? It's not polite to keep your mother waiting," _a woman's voice called impatiently.

"Coming, Mother!" Zel called back, then whispered to Demyx, "You need to go."

"But-"

"I'll see you later!" She pecked a quick kiss on his cheek. "Just go!"

She rushed to the window while he swayed dizzily, unsure what had just happened. When she began to hoist her Mother up with her hair, he realized he didn't have time to figure out.

He stumbled into a dark corridor, vaguely wondering if he'd end up in Agrabah.

XXX

"How was your day, Mother?" Rapunzel asked with extra cheeriness.

"Oh, fine, dear…" Her mother sounded tired as she set herself down in a cozy armchair. "Though the rabbits have gotten into my berry patches, so there won't be any with dinner tonight."

"That's great," Rapunzel said, hands clasped together as she stared off into space.

Her mother raised her eyebrows. "And how was _your _day, my flower?"

Rapunzel tried to snap herself out of it, but the light in her eyes remained. "Oh, nothing special."

"Hmm… Well, your hair is looking rather distressed. Did you wash it this morning?

"Uh, you know, I don't remember. Better wash it again just in case!" She called as she ran up the stairs to her bathroom, trying to hold in a happy squeal. She only allowed herself to say his name after she shut the door behind her.

"Demyx…" She grinned at herself in the mirror. "I have a friend, and his name is Demyx."

Her grin wasn't the only thing she saw in the mirror; her hair really _was _dirty. As she combed through it and washed out the grains of sand, her fingers found a light purple seashell. She remembered something he'd said while they were building sandcastles, about how you could hold them up to your ear and hear…

"The sound of the ocean." She moved it from her ear to her heart. "So even when you're not here, I can listen, and I'll remember."

XXX

"Number IX," Saïx growled.

Demyx stopped in his stealth mission to his room, straightening from his crouch and running a hand through his hair. "Heeey, Saïx! I was just, uh, looking for you!"

He held out his hand. "Then I presume you have a well-written mission report to give me."

"Um… well…"

He could write one. He certainly knew enough about Rapunzel's Tower and its lonely inhabitant… he probably wouldn't be sent back there on future missions if he didn't. But could he just give Saïx everything he knew about his new friend?

"Uh, I need a new form," Demyx lied. "Mine got eaten. By a lizard."

Saïx shoved a blank mission report form at his chest and strode off, not even gracing him with a reply.

"Thanks," Demyx said anyway.

After walking to his room and flopping on his bed, he began to come up with an idea. That idea was to promptly crumple up the mission report and throw it at the pile of junk heaped in the corner of his room.

Demyx smiled. There would always be other missions, but it wasn't every day he made a new friend.

"Better get to sleep," he said to himself. "I'm gonna get an Unidentified Giant Heartless mission tomorrow."

**A/N: I would like to point out that 'Unidentified Giant Heartless' acronyms to UGH. XD**

**Before anyone asks, yes, I do have an idea for a sequel… but it would involve the actual plot of Tangled and Flynn if I chose to write it, and I'm not sure if I want to do that… The original plan for this was for it to be completely platonic and fit into the timelines of both KH and Tangled, but Dem and Zel ended up working together a little better than I expected, so I don't know anymore. *sweatdrop* I kind of ruined canon!Tangled for myself, because now I want Demyx to be in it. XD/*sweatdrop***


End file.
